Over in the world of food, things are getting messy. Finger-licking, crowd-pleasing, taste-indulgent kind of messy. As people lean towards a sense of escapism through their food and drink choices, foodies are embracing their rebellious side and turbo-charging a new era of gastro-indulgence.
In the Canvas8 October 2022 Sector Snapshot of Eating and Drinking, we discovered that post-pandemic people are engaging with their food and drink choices a little differently. Our Sector Behaviour on this is called Mess Makers, all about the consumers who are rejecting foodie habits of old and are instead opting for more sensory-based food experiences that celebrate gusto, extravagance, and maybe most importantly, food gratification. In fact, 57% of Gen Zers and Yers describe their diet as ‘unrestricted’. Embracing excess can be a path toward comfort and excitement in troubling times, so after the turbulence experienced over the past few years it's no surprise that people are looking for moments of joy wherever they can find them.
At-home meals may embrace the less attractive side of dining from the comfort of people's homes, but the world of ‘junk’ food is opening up these behind-closed-doors behaviours as people embrace messier markers of a new ‘try it all’ attitude to eating. Pleasure, tactility, and informality are what people want from their food and drink consumption now, and this sense of maximal satisfaction has been adopted by brands such as KFC and Truff, which are rejecting aesthetic perfection and allowing consumers to get back to what they do best, chowing down on some good old food. Food artists are also creating new styles of ’ugly’ cakes that are borderline chaotic and grotesque as a way to battle food perfection fatigue, and Gen Zers are rebelling against calorie-counting and finding comfort in food as they search for a sense of liberation post-pandemic.
This behaviour got us at Canvas8 thinking about how people in the US and the UK feel about comfort food, which led to connected Vox Pops that explore these topics. In the US, the respondents described indulgence as a standard marked by large portion sizes and easy availability of junk foods, with convenience central to why people choose comfort foods. And overseas in the UK, there was a definite zeal in rejecting the notion of guilty pleasures altogether, with many saying that finding joy where they could was paramount. As we noted in the insights of these reports, there is a significant opportunity for brands in this sector to facilitate these moments of joy and reignite people's passion for food exploration. In the US Amazon has partnered with Grubhub to offer Amazon Prime members a year's worth of free delivery on takeaway purchases, indulging the mess makers’ desire for comfort even when money is tight.
